I had it in mind to complete these two ship’s logbooks in time for a family get-together this weekend. And I did finish. They turned out great. I tried my hand at doing the ‘coptic’ headbands on the blue book, but I can’t say that I’m thrilled with how they turned out — but I’m also not entirely displeased. All of the pages are right-side-up in both books (which doesn’t always happen). And the binding lines of the stitching came out clearly and cleanly. That’s good, too. And the books themselves have the right heft to them.
I’m currently working on a third, much smaller book, for a friend of mine. It doesn’t really have enough heft to it, and many fewer signatures means that the book doesn’t really retain its structure easily enough.
Still, the pair of books spans a pair of years — the pages were laid out in 2017, and the books were done being assembled in 2018. And with luck, they’ll be recording the voyages of a ship named “Puck” for quite some time. I hope the owner will think me a good fellow for my efforts.
